Saturday, January 7, 2017, 9:37:36 AM, Denis Bredelet wrote: > Hi Daniel, > >>> That was also my impression on the OFBiz tweet, as a software >>> developer. The last is important, that I'm looking at it as a >>> developer. FreeMarker, unless OFBiz, is mostly only interesting for >>> them I believe. It doesn't have an UI that a manager type could click >>> around. It's not a complete end-user product, it's Java library used >>> internally by other products. > > I am thinking of contributing a very simple UI for FreeMarker. > Something able to read a single template and process it with a > datamodel pulled from various sources (user interface window, properties > file, XML file…) > > Would that be useful and help with advertising FreeMarker?
I believe it's something that many users need, because it's not always convenient to try things right in the real product that integrates FreeMarker. Especially if you just want the wrap your head around something you have just read in the Manual. So I was considering creating a such GUI, only my priorities (core maintenance) didn't allow that. And then suddenly come http://freemarker-online.kenshoo.com/, so we do have something like that, but it could be improved further, also perhaps an offline version (like a SWT application or such) can be handy (if you want to connect to a local DB, etc). These template evaluators are also useful to draw the user's attention to best practices and features. Like if you go to http://freemarker-online.kenshoo.com/, you will be aware of output formats, a relatively novel but very useful feature. > I have some code to use as a starting point on my website: > http://bredelet.com/Denis/FreeMarker%20first%20steps.html These are some getting started examples. What are your ideas about the final product? > Maybe this could come as a separate JAR to avoid loading UI classes > unnecessarily. > Cheers, > — Denis. -- Thanks, Daniel Dekany
